Emdeon selects IBM as technology provider for patient-centric clinical information exchange

Emdeon Inc. (NYSE: EM), one of the largest health information networks in the nation focusing on clinical exchange and a leading provider of healthcare revenue and payment cycle management solutions, today announced the selection of IBM (NYSE: IBM) as its technology provider for patient-centric clinical information exchange.

The five-year, multi-phased software licensing deal for IBM Initiate Patient will allow Emdeon the ability to assemble a virtual view of patient data for use by healthcare providers. This virtual patient view will be populated with data from Emdeon's clinical information network that today processes over 150 million clinical and ePrescribing information exchanges per year. IBM Initiate Patient accurately identifies patients to enable targeted delivery of clinical information to healthcare providers at the point of care and within their routine software workflow. Through Emdeon's health information network, authorized healthcare providers will be able to retrieve a patient's medication history or other clinical information through a single query of Emdeon's vast data resources and receive results within seconds of the request. The first phase of the multi-phase project between Emdeon and IBM will focus on medication reconciliation, electronic prescribing data and the patient's medical history; all delivered to authorized healthcare providers to help improve patient outcomes.

"Emdeon's leading health information network sustains a tremendous amount of data from the majority of patients, providers, pharmacies and payers in the U.S.," said George Lazenby, chief executive officer for Emdeon. "This data can give healthcare providers important information about their patients at the point of care. IBM Initiate Patient gives us the ability to produce a portable, powerful and accurate healthcare record within our existing nationwide network to enable the healthcare industry to leap forward in its pursuit of patient-centric healthcare."

IBM Initiate Patient touches 80 percent of the population of North America. Relied upon by more than 100 healthcare systems, more than 40 health information exchanges and many of the nation's largest retail pharmacies, IBM is the trusted foundation of health information exchange initiatives around the globe. IBM's deep expertise in this area is based on nearly 20 years of work creating interoperable health information projects, including work with the IBM Healthcare Collaborative Network and the prototype of the Nationwide Health Information Network (NHIN).

"The accurate patient identification provided by IBM Initiate Patient is a pre-requisite to exchanging clinical information among the distinctly different stakeholders participating in a health information network like Emdeon's," said Sean Cassidy, director, healthcare products, information management, IBM Software Group. "We are excited to be part of Emdeon's efforts to transform how healthcare is delivered by providing better access to information."

Emdeon will host an educational presentation with IBM at booth number 2201 at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) national conference in Orlando, February 21-23, 2011.